Should You Call Your Patients?

These days, more often than not, the answer is no.

According to the stats at RoboKiller.com, an advocacy site and app developer that tracks the prevalence of robocalls, there were 6.2 billion robocalls made to phone numbers in the US in August 2021 alone. It’s more than likely that outreach from your practice went ignored due to the onslaught of unwanted calls.

As we’ve discussed in a previous blog post, younger patients in particular prefer a digital experience, even before the COVID-19 pandemic drove many of our interactions online.

In an app-driven world, medical practices now have to compete not just with other healthcare organizations in the area, but the seamless digital experiences patients have grown accustomed to in retail, banking, and entertainment. If anything, the pandemic has accelerated healthcare consumerism, as patients seek out practices and healthcare systems that have a robust digital engagement strategy.

In our clients’ practices, we’ve seen that opening up the ability to collect copays or outstanding balances online improves collection rates. Automated email and text outreach drives a lower number of no-shows, and improved patient recall to help close care gaps.

An initial outlay for adding an outreach module to your EMR when available, or working with an outside vendor, will often pay for itself with higher collections, improve care coordination, and free up your staff to better serve the patients in front of them.